Loyalty in Cancel Culture

Loyalty is an often-sought trait among humans. It is prized among family and friends, soldiers and businessmen, preachers and pimps. People have lost their countries, families, and lives over questions of loyalty throughout human history. The word is poorly understood and grossly abused. I’ve spent the past seven years dwelling on loyalty as my relationships have undergone tremendous change.

Loyalty in community is what I have been studying through application. To live abroad is a daunting experience at times. I have discovered the loyalty among expats is unique and valuable. It is a sort of advanced courtesy.

Blood relations do not guarantee loyalty. The news is littered with the carnage of broken and dysfunctional family relationships. Children are the victims in these stories all too often.

Of all the relationships in our lives, parent child relationships are the only ones I believe where loyalty is non-negotiable. Children do not ask to be here. Your only job as a parent is to adhere to the bond of faithfulness and devotion born upon the first breath ex utero. Notice I did not include other family members in this equation. Parents choose their role, no one else does. I am fully aware many women all over the world are living in regrettable situations, I’m not talking about them. A human who fails to be faithful to their offspring is not likely to display true loyalty to anyone else.

Loyalty is extremely desirable in friendship and extended family relationships. There is a reason why people describe close friends as sisters, brothers, and cousins. It is a de facto designation that erases the boundary line between blood and others. A friend or family member who demonstrates support, loving honesty, and respectful constructive criticism is to be valued. Loyalty in these relationships is almost always accompanied by discretion. An indiscrete friend cannot be fully trusted. Trust is an essential component if one expects loyalty to be returned.

A friend or family member who lacks discretion or trust is highly unlikely to be loyal in challenging circumstances. Loyalty is most valuable when we are not around to witness it. Loyalty covers you when you are absent from whatever conversation is taking place. Loyalty recommends your business, defends your reputation, and forgives.

Forgiveness is a large part of loyalty because there are no perfect people. In my journey I have sadly witnessed the demise of great couples, businesses, and friendships because people won’t forgive. Humans make mistakes. Sometimes very impactful ones. Loyalty is not blind, it is gentle. It sees you and continues to walk with you through your moments of clumsiness and sometimes, selfishness. If the relationship is valuable, changed behavior will accompany the repentant heart. If both parties are loyal, their relationship will weather the storm.

That brings me to today’s cancel culture. We are addicted to destruction. With a few typed characters and a sarcastic meme we make light of the pain in other folks’ lives. We deem them irredeemable, entirely replaceable, and unworthy of continued support (from anyone). Who are these people to us, anyway? No one. A two-dimensional face in a picture. A participant in a forty second viral clip. Imagine your entire life and worth being called into question because one of your many bad choices is recorded and shared. World-wide.

What kind of community are we building with this pattern of behavior? It reminds me of Hester Prynne and her scarlet letter. Or, for a more modern (and appropriate) comparison, Cersei Lannister and her walk of shame. The bell ringing stringently, the Septa calling out, and the people throwing refuse and insults.

I am not excusing bad behavior. I am not saying people should be shielded from consequences. I am saying that losing your job and never being able to find work again is a bit extreme. Working is not an option. Cancel culture, to me, is the natural consequence of our prison culture. If a felon can never find a job again because she made a mistake, then the same should hold true for other people who make social mistakes that we are no longer in the mood to tolerate. When applying for work, you won’t have to check the box “Went Viral for Being Drunk in Public” but it is likely your face will be recognized for a long, long time.

Making a mistake should not see you cast out from your family, community, and all that you hold dear. Living in community requires us all to sacrifice some degree of comfort. It requires us to relinquish the harsh judgement of black and white thinking. At some point it must require we revisit our obsessive need to take clandestine pictures and videos of others at their very lowest points.

I wish we were able to give one another the loyalty we all desire. Loyalty is not the blind devotion of a sycophant. Loyalty simply is faithfulness. Loyalty tells the truth. Loyalty forgives. Loyalty allows for humanity.

Cancel culture does none of that. 

In my personal life, I have discovered that over time, as relationships change, so do loyalties. People I once shared many intimacies with become distant friends, but my loyalty to them doesn’t change. There is an umbrella of affection and protection for relationships that are no longer fresh as they once were. As a writer, I am careful not to make the realities of people I have befriended fodder for my stories. That is a type of loyalty.

In my professional life, I have witnessed teachers in every circumstance. I have seen examples of truly brilliant instruction and some instances where it was clearly an off day. However, I don’t run to the lounge to announce, “Ooooweee, it’s a struggle in 4A today!” That is another type of loyalty.

When flying and you see a parent struggling with a fussy child and you smile instead of frown and huff out great gusts of frustrated air, you show a simple form of loyalty. When you patiently wait for the person counting out coins to pay for gas, you show loyalty. When you refrain from writing a burning review about a small business because you were inconvenienced, that is another form of loyalty.

It seems in this day the simplest show of support is withheld for the slightest of errors. My food took too long to arrive, let me rate them1 star in the review, never mind the fact you inhaled the burger because it was delicious. The teller didn’t smile, let me complain to the bank manager, even though you were in a line 12 people long and she was efficient and speedy. He used “your” instead of “you’re” in a text. Nope. Can’t talk to this ignoramus again. Blocked! Never mind the fact you still pronounce the “l” in salmon.

Loyalty is something we all need. We require support. We needed it when we were learning to walk, to read, and count money. We need loyalty from family, friends, and yes, though we are loathe to admit it, sometimes strangers. We will never get anywhere canceling one another for every error and perceived slight. Now that the internet has given us the world’s largest bully pulpit, we are free to vent our spleen into the vastness that is cyberspace. Not just our commentary, but pictures and videos too!

I can only hope that as time continues its inevitable forward march, we will become a more loyal people. A people slow to anger and willing to offer up grace to friend and stranger alike. That we will offer others the loyalty we ourselves need. So, let’s raise our glasses and make a toast.

Here’s to peace of mind, love, and loyalty, may we always have all that we need even as we are willing to offer it to others. *Clink Clink*

Author: Nature Mariah Sargent